


By Morning's Grey Light

by ShadowEtienne



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Faramir as Prince of Ithilien, Gen, unanswered bits of Middle Earth history
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-27
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-09-02 14:14:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8670685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowEtienne/pseuds/ShadowEtienne
Summary: Faramir has been settling into his role as the Steward of Gondor and Prince of Ithilien.  In his new lands, he finds a surprise one grey morning, for there are still elves who walk this land.





	

**Author's Note:**

> From a prompt on tumblr from worldflower:  
> Hey if you're looking for something to write maybe something with Mithrellas meeting Boromir and/or Faramir
> 
> Thank you so much for the prompt!

Faramir had returned to Ithilien.  There were many changes underway, and he was glad at least to have the chance to see the lands that were now his to rule and care for while they were still in the planning stages.  He trusted Beregond, with his life and wishes, but it had been too long since he had been far from city walls.  He had been pushed by Queen Arwen to take a short time away from Minas Tirith, to allow him to settle more firmly in his position, and to allow King Elessar to settle more firmly in his own.  Faramir understood, though there was a part of him that feared leaving the reins of daily tasks in his King’s hands, for Elessar was a thoughtful, kind, and charismatic leader, but he was not accustomed to the day to day tasks of a running a kingdom.

Faramir was better able to see that the Queen had been right from the distance of the lands that were now his home.  He had loved Ithilien since the first moment he had set foot in it, even when it had been shadowed by the darkness of Mordor, but in the new spring, now that the rule of King Elessar had truly taken hold, it was more beautiful and serene still.  Not far from where his walking had taken him, hidden by the curvature of the line of hills of Emyn Arnen, construction had begun on the home where he and Eowyn would have their seat, and with her aid, it had been styled after the halls of Rohan, a home for her far from home.  Faramir found that he liked the simpler style, with more wood and less stone, for it reminded him of the good parts of the long days before the coming of the King, the days that he and his brother had camped on the route to visiting their Uncle in Dol Amroth, and the days that there had been victories that he had celebrated with his men in these very lands.

He found a trickling stream, banks lined with flowering rushes, purple and blue.  There were birds in the trees, and he counted three dragonflies flitting above the surface of the stream.  There was no sign here of people, and he sat on a fallen log, already sprouting new life, and listened.  Any creatures that had been disturbed by his approach soon returned to their habitual behavior, and he smiled to see the mother duck leading her ducklings to the stream.  There was nothing that he wanted more in that moment than just to sit in the pale light of the morning and watch the world of Ithilien, where all seemed right and good at last.

Suddenly, across the stream, a willowy figure stepped from behind a tall tree with pale, peeling bark.  Faramir froze, eyes wide.  She was tall and pale with long dark hair falling past her waist, and she was wrapped in a cloak of silver green, tattered about the edges but still strong.  From beneath it peaked a dark skirt, blue or grey, he could not tell from such a distance.  For just a moment, he thought he knew her, and mouthed, uncertain, “Mother?”

He shook his head then, knowing that his first leap of reason made no sense.  His mother had died shortly after his fifth birthday, and he had only hazy memories of her in reality, though he carried a small painting of her in a locket that his Uncle Imrahil had passed to him.  He realized, after the shock of finding someone in these woods wore off, that there was one detail distinctly off.  As she reached up and pushed her hair behind her ear, clearly as uncertain as he was, he saw that her ears were pointed, more akin to the Queen’s than his own.

She spoke before he could ask who she was, “Galador?  My son?”

Then he knew, though he could hardly believe that it might be true.  Faramir knew that he had the look of the Princes of Dol Amroth, from his Mother, far more than his brother ever had, but he had never thought to be taken for one of that line dead nearly nine hundred years.  Faramir saw the confusion he felt mirrored in her face, and he shook his head slowly, saying, “I am not he, but he was my grandfather many times over.”

She moved quickly and lightly, coming to the edge of the water and skipping across it on the small stones that came just below the surface, not even causing ripples in the stream in the process, and she paused just before him.  She looked down at him, taller than him by a good handspan, and she said softly, voice still lost, “You look just like my son, but grown.  I saw him last when he still was not quite of age.”

Faramir nodded and replied, “My name is Faramir, and my mother was of the line of Princes of Dol Amroth.  Are you, perhaps, Mithrellas?”

She stared at him, eyes shadowed with memory for a moment, and then she simply said, “Yes.”

He smiled at her, still uncertain, but hoping to be welcoming, and said, “You had been lost to my line for over nine hundred years, but you are remembered in song and legend.  Galador and Gilmith have long since passed into memory as well.”

She put her hand on a nearby tree, swaying a bit like a sapling in a strong breeze, and she said, voice light and sad, “Has it been that long?  The shadows grew, and I slept, and when they passed, I woke.”

Faramir nodded, curious about many things now that the initial confusion and shock began to wear off, but he did not ask his questions yet, simply waited, for she seemed far more confused now than he was.  She asked, uncertain, “Has the darkness left these lands, or simply moved farther away?”

He spoke softly, not wanting to startle her, and hoping that she would find his answers good, “The darkness has passed from these lands, for the One Ring has at last been destroyed, and the servants of its master routed.  There is a true King in Gondor again, and he has reunited the lands of Gondor and Arnor.”

She asked, “Has there been no King since Mardil began to watch the throne?  I remember that.”

Faramir shook his head, “Not for about nine hundred years.  There were Ruling Stewards for all that time.  I was the last of them, on my father’s side, but there is a King again, Elessar, the heir of Arnor and Gondor.  His Queen is Arwen daughter of Elrond and Celebrian, who has chosen to stay on these shores.”

Mithrellas stilled, no longer swaying, and spoke with more certainty, “I know Celebrian.  She and her mother dwelt in Lorinand before Nimrodel and King Amroth left.”

Faramir nodded.  He felt as though he was talking to one lost in the past, and perhaps, he thought, in a sense she was.  He spoke gently as he would to a frightened child or horse, “Celebrian has long since passed into the West, and Elrond and the Lady Galadriel soon plan to.  There are those among the elves who still plan to walk these lands for many years though, and Ithilien, where I have my seat, is home to a small group in these days, led by Legolas son of Thranduil of Eryn Lasgalen.”

She still had the look of loss in her face when she asked, “Could I trouble you to take me to one of my kin?  I have slept apart from this world too long under shadow of darkness, and find myself lost now that there is light again.  Too much has changed, and yet there is still much that is the same, I remember these trees in the land of Ithilien.”

Faramir offered her his arm, somewhat uncertain if she could fully stand without aid, for she was leaning a good bit against the tree that she had placed her hand against.  He told her gently, “Of course my lady.  Come with me, and I will show you to them.”

She did lean quite a bit upon his arm when she took it, and he kept his pace slow and steady.  He was glad that he was not far from the encampment of the elves that Legolas had brought with him from the Woodland Realm for she would have been hard pressed to make the journey to Minas Tirith as she was then.

As he drew near, one of the elves that had followed Legolas there, who he recognized but did not remember the name of appeared from between the trees.  She said, “Lord Faramir, I see that you have brought a guest, shall I find the Prince for you?”

Faramir nodded and said, “That would be good of you…”

He paused, uncertain of the elf’s name, and the guard smiled slightly and said, “I am Langlanthir, who shall I tell the Prince you bring?”

Faramir smiled and replied, “Thank you Langlanthir.  I bring with me Mithrellas, once of Lothlorien, but long since left, and mother of the line of Princes of Dol Amroth.  She has woken with the passing of the Shadow.”

Langlanthir nodded and disappeared into the trees as seamlessly as she had appeared.  Faramir continued in the direction they had come from, but he was not at all surprised when Legolas appeared before they reached the camp.  Mithrellas smiled at Legolas, clearly relieved to see someone of her own people, if not someone she knew, and Faramir watched as she walked more strongly over to Legolas and Langlanthir who was standing beside him, asking something in a language that he recognized as the Silvan tongue from its use between the elves of Ithilien.

Legolas responded in kind.  She looked back at Faramir then and said in a gentle tone, “My child, I would like to see you again.”

He smiled at her and replied, “I would like that too.”

He watched as she slipped away into the forest with the other elves, and then he turned to return home, glad again that he had chosen to come to the woods of Ithilien that morning.


End file.
